Innovation + Future

Care Coordination May Prove Vital to Payer Survival

A new report points to the embracing of care coordination as one of the means by which insurers may find success in today’s changing health care environment.

As FierceHealthcarenotes in its coverage of the IDC Health Insights issue brief “Digital Transformation and New Economics Highlight Payer Disintermediation,” payers typically served three main purposes: underwriting, setting up provider networks and processing claims.

“Employer-direct healthcare, governmental intervention, consumer sharing networks, and provider consolidation and repurposing are all chipping away at this industry, which struggles not to be the next Blockbuster Video.”

With the shift toward value-based reimbursement, payers may need to consider expanding their offerings to include such services as care coordination and data analytics.

FierceHealthcare points out that some payers — including Humana and Cigna — are already working to capitalize on their existing data and tech capabilities by providing more information to providers that help make better clinical and financial decisions.